USA

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Senate has voted to begin work on a nearly $1 trillion national infrastructure plan, acting with sudden speed after weeks of fits and starts once the White House and a bipartisan group of senators agreed on major provisions of the package that’s key to President Joe Biden’s agenda.

Biden welcomed the accord as one that would show America can “do big things.” It includes the most significant long-term investments in nearly a century, he said, on par with building the transcontinental railroad or the Interstate highway system.

NEW YORK, Jul 28 (APP): Amid deteriorating Afghan security situation, Prime Minister Imran Khan emphasized Tuesday that the best choice was a negotiated political settlement to the long-running conflict in Afghanistan, saying Pakistan would remain helpful in the peace process.

“So, the Taliban sit down with the other side and they form an inclusive government — This is the best outcome; there is no other outcome because the military solution has failed,” he said in an interview with Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) ‘Newshour’, a primetime television programme.

WASHINGTON, July 27 (Xinhua) -- The International Monetary Fund (IMF) on Tuesday maintained its global economic growth forecast at 6 percent for 2021, calling attention to widening gaps in global recovery and warning of downside risks amid vaccine inequality.

In its latest World Economic Outlook (WEO), the IMF said the global growth forecast for this year is unchanged from April's outlook, but the composition has changed, as it upgraded forecast for advanced economies and downgraded that for emerging market and developing economies.

CANTON, Ga. (AP) — A man accused of killing eight people, mostly women of Asian descent, at Atlanta-area massage businesses pleaded guilty to murder Tuesday in four of the killings and was sentenced to spend the rest of his life in prison.

Robert Aaron Long, 22, still faces the death penalty in the other deaths, which are being prosecuted in another county.

ALEXANDRIA, Va. (AP) — A former Air Force intelligence analyst who once helped find targets for deadly U.S. drone strikes was sentenced to 45 months in prison for leaking top-secret details about the program.

Daniel Hale, 33, told a federal judge he felt compelled to leak information to a journalist out of guilt over his own participation in a program that he believed was indiscriminately killing civilians in Afghanistan far from the battlefield.

MCLEAN, Va. (AP) — President Joe Biden used his first visit with rank-and-file members of the U.S. intelligence community — a part of government that was frequently criticized by his predecessor Donald Trump — to make a promise that he will “never politicize” their work.

Biden waited more than six months to make the short drive across the Potomac River on Tuesday to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, giving analysts and national security leaders — often derided by Trump as the “deep state” — some breathing room.

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — Republican Jake Ellzey of Texas won a U.S. House seat on Tuesday night over a rival backed by Donald Trump, dealing the former president a defeat in a test of his endorsement power since leaving office.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The White House is strongly considering requiring federal employees to show proof they’ve been vaccinated against the coronavirus or otherwise submit to regular testing and wear a mask — a potentially major shift in policy that reflects growing concerns about the spread of the more infectious delta variant.

LAPORTE, Texas (AP) — Two people are dead after a chemical leak Tuesday evening at plant in La Porte, Texas, company officials said.

The incident happened about 7:35 p.m. and involved an acetic acid leak at the LyondellBasell facility in the La Porte Complex, company spokesperson Chevalier Gray said in a statement. Emergency responders from the City of La Porte and Channel Industries Mutual Aid were on the scene Tuesday night.

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden’s latest leap into the Senate’s up-and-down efforts to clinch a bipartisan $1 trillion infrastructure deal comes with even more at stake than his coveted plans for boosting road, rail and other public works projects.